


When I’m Feeling Alone, You Remind Me Of Home

by sarahalwaysx3



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Bobbi Morse (mentioned) - Freeform, Childhood Friends, Christmas AU, F/M, Fluff and Angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:26:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27824476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarahalwaysx3/pseuds/sarahalwaysx3
Summary: After years away, Daisy Johnson returns to her hometown just in time for the holidays. Looking for some peace and quiet, she not only finds back to her old self, but also reawakens old friendships and long forgotten feelings. But can Daisy really escape her past? What is she running from?
Relationships: Alphonso "Mack" Mackenzie/Yo Yo Rodriguez, Leo Fitz/Jemma Simmons, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Phil Coulson/Melinda May, Skye | Daisy Johnson & Antoine Triplett, Skye | Daisy Johnson/Antoine Triplett
Comments: 11
Kudos: 18





	1. December 1st

**Author's Note:**

> This is my attempt at a Tripdaisy Holiday AU. Originally, my plan was to post a chapter every day until Christmas, but knowing my writing habits, it might frag on much, much longer than that, haha. But, for now, here it is!

**_December 1st_ **

Daisy had always thought the world looked so beautiful, so magical coated in white. When asked to describe it, she would explain that the season prompted a sense of serenity within her, like someone had laid out a blanket over the world, making it impossible to feel anything but joy and peace. But that had been a long time ago.

Today, she couldn’t help but resent the blankness of it all. The curtain of fog and the wall of thick snowflakes outside the window seemed to be relentlessly suffocating anything in their path, erasing every last memory of the colors that fall had brought with it. Even the early-afternoon sun could not break through to bathe the world in its soft light, and Daisy felt grateful for the glass separating her from the cold. Nevertheless, a shiver went through her every time the train flashed past a tree or a car or a house in the distance, disturbing the view of the otherwise smooth landscape.

“Ahem.”

She jumped. Her head flew around to where the noise that had ripped her out of her thoughts had come from and Daisy found herself faced with an elderly man in a black uniform, looking down at her expectantly. “I’m sorry, what was that?”

“Your ticket, please, ma’am.” The man held out his hand.

“Oh”, she breathed, relieved. For a second, she had thought… “Of course.” She began rummaging through her purse, trying to get a hold of the small document-filled folder her friend Bobbi had given her almost twenty-four hours ago, when she had hugged her Goodbye at Grand Central Station. Right when the conductor cleared his throat one more time, she finally pulled the ticket out and handed it to him. 

After a quick glance at it, the man used a small machine to punch a hole in it before handing it back. “New York to Chicago, huh? That’s a long trip. Is Chicago your final destination?”

“Yes”, Daisy lied. Logically, she knew he was just trying to be friendly and make small-talk, but she couldn’t ignore the instant chill creeping down her spine at his question.

“Well then, you’re lucky.” The genuine expression on his face almost made her want to smile back. “You’re almost there. Have a safe rest of your trip, ma’am.”

“Thanks”, she mumbled, but he was already gone.

The following hour flew by in the blink of an eye. Daisy was about to doze off with her cheek resting against the cold window when a woman’s voice on the speaker announced her destination. After the train had come to a stop, she waited until most people had already streamed out onto the platform before heaving her suitcase – which had also been a gift from Bobbi – out of the overhead compartment and finally hurried off the train. 

It was only a short walk to the Greyhound station and when she got there, her bus was already waiting for departure. Before climbing on it, she made sure the hood of her sweater was pulled far down into her face. As she was heading down the bus aisle to the far back, she scanned the faces of every other person on the bus, and the tension didn’t leave her body until the Chicago skyline was far behind them.

* * *

When she startled awake, Daisy wasn’t sure what had woken her up. It could have been the light of the setting sun blinding her as it was reflecting in the window, or the bus stopping with a jerk, but what seemed to be the most likely option was the driver’s voice in the front shouting: “Snowboro!”

Quickly gathering up her belongings, Daisy hopped off the bus and into a fresh layer of snow that crunched under her boots. She stood still at the bus stop and waited until the Greyhound disappeared down the road before turning around and heading the other direction.

Even though it had been years since she last visited, she still knew the streets of Snowboro by heart, recognized every corner and every streetlight, and so, with every step she took, the comfort of her hometown seemed to lift a little bit of the weight on her shoulders off of her.

Daisy followed the street past the old bakery next to the town square, where she remembered playing with her friends when they were children. She continued dragging her suitcase down Main Street, where she walked by Mackenzie’s Auto Repair Shop right across the book store where she had spent the majority of her childhood sitting between the shelves with her nose in a book or helping her parents sort through new deliveries.

She smiled to herself. It wasn’t far now.

Just when the sun fully disappeared behind the top of the trees lining the town’s boundaries, Daisy reached the small house with the yellow façade and the white picket fence. The lights on the inside were turned on and she could make out the silhouettes of two people moving around in the kitchen. She inhaled deeply and braced herself, as she climbed up the three steps to the porch and before she was able to talk herself out of it, she rang the doorbell.

Her stomach felt tight when she heard movement inside the house. But she had no time to think about it, because mere seconds later the door swung open and she was faced with the kind eyes and warm smile of an older man. His hair was thinner and had begun to turn grayer since the last time she had seen him, but the knot in her stomach instantly untangled when she saw him.

“Hi, Dad.”

It only took a split second, but Daisy practically saw the gears in his head shifting and she could pin point the exact moment he recognized her. His mouth hung open without a sound coming out.

Then there was more movement behind him and a moment later a woman with dark hair that looked just like Daisy’s appeared in the hallway. “Phil? Who is it?”

“Hi, mom.”

The expression on her mother’s face matched her fathers, but she regained her composure much quicker. “Daisy”, her mom said as she stepped around her husband to pull her daughter into a tight hug, “what are you doing here?”

By now, Phil had managed to recover from the initial surprise. “Maybe let her come inside first, Melinda”, he scolded and reached for the handle of his daughter’s suitcase. “We were about to have dinner. You hungry, kid?”

Gratefully, Daisy let her father take her suitcase from her. “Very.”

From the moment she set foot into her childhood home, any fears or worries she had had were forgotten. Instead, she was engulfed in the smell of her mother’s cooking and the warmth of the fire crackling in the fireplace.

“Why didn’t you call ahead, honey?”, Melinda called from the kitchen where she was checking on the dinner on the stove, while Daisy shrugged off her coat and shoes.

“It was sort of a last-minute decision”, Daisy replies. That was almost the truth, but she knew her parents wouldn’t dig deeper. For now, at least.

“Well, I can’t say that we mind”, her father said, now finally getting a chance to hug his daughter. He wrapped his arms around her and with a sigh, Daisy relaxed against his chest. “I’m so glad you’re home, kid.”

He gently maneuvered her into the kitchen and onto a chair at the dining table and for the next couple of minutes, she watched her parents finish cooking dinner while making small talk. Daisy scoured the room with her eyes. At a first glance, nothing seemed to have changed. The walls were lined with pictures of the three of them, starting with the one their neighbor had taken the day Daisy had moved in to the May-Coulson household. It had been a hot day in August, only a little over a month after Daisy’s 5th birthday. In the picture, her little face was frowning at the camera. Right next to it hung the photo from two years later, and her expression couldn’t be more different. In this one, she was smiling from ear to ear, flashing the big gap where her top front teeth had been. She was clinging to Phil’s back while her fathers’ arm was wrapped around Melinda’s waist. Her mother had one hand resting on the back of Daisy’s head, the other one holding up the brand-new adoption certificate. All these years later, it was still her favorite photo.

But along the old photos, Daisy spotted a collection of new ones, moments she didn’t recognize. There was one of Phil and Melinda at a beach, a chain of flowers around her mothers’ neck and a significant sunburn on her fathers’ face. Another one showed the town square covered in snow and lights, a big crowd all huddled close together to fit in the frame while a firework was exploding on the sky behind them. A lump formed in Daisy’s throat when her eyes got stuck on a card with the picture of a newborn baby printed on it. In big, blue letters, the card read: “Welcome to the World Ayla Fitzsimmons.”

“Isn’t she cute?”

Her mothers’ voice brought her back to the moment just before the tears could well up in her eyes. Daisy hastily blinked a few times and plastered a smile on her face. “Yeah, she’s beautiful.”

After Melinda had set all the pans on the table, they ate in comfortable silence. Daisy had to hold herself back from gulping everything down without chewing first. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d eaten.

After dinner, Daisy pulled her legs up onto her chair and relaxed back with a content sigh.

“So”, her mom said, her voice sounding cautious, as if not wanting to scare her daughter away with the question that was to come. “How long are you planning on staying?”

“I’m not sure yet”, Daisy responded, lifting her shoulders slightly. “But I thought I could stay for a little while at least. If that’s okay with you.”

“That’s more than okay with us”, Phil said, an earnest look on his face. He leaned over to place his hand on hers. “You know you can always come home.”

“Yeah, I know.” Daisy gave his hand a gentle squeeze to demonstrate her gratefulness, before getting up off her chair. Before she could say what she wanted to say, a long yawn rose up in her throat and she couldn’t hold it back.

“Go get some sleep, kid”, Phil instructed, as if reading her mind. “We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

Feeling thankful, Daisy nodded. “Yeah, okay. Good night.”

Her parents echoed her Good Night.

She was already two steps up the stairs, when she made the split-second decision to turn around again and address the elephant in the room they had been ignoring all night.

“I’m sorry I haven’t called or texted in a while. And I’m really sorry I haven’t visited.” Her voice was quiet and at first, she wasn’t sure if her parents had even heard her.

But then Melinda’s face took on that specific soft expression that was only reserved for her daughter alone, the one that always let Daisy know that everything was going to be okay, no matter what. “You’re here now. That’s all that matters.”


	2. December 2nd

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this while drunk, so I can not be held accountable for the lack of quality in this one!
> 
> As always, kudos and comments are suuuper appreciated :)

_**December 2nd** _

The next morning, Daisy woke up to the smell of breakfast that still hung in the air that filled the house. The sun outside her childhood bedroom’s window already stood high on the sky, indicating that it must nearly be noon already. She shuffled around on her mattress and stretched her sore arms and legs before heaving herself out of bed.

After a quick, hot shower and changing into a pair of fresh jeans and a sweater, she headed downstairs where a plate of pancakes was waiting for her on the kitchen table. The post-it note next to the plate read in Melinda’s neat handwriting: “Have a nice day.” Right below it, Phil’s not-quite-so-neat scrawl said: “Come by the store if you want.” There was a big smiley face drawn right next to her dad’s message.

Daisy smiled to herself while eating the pancakes. It was nice spending the morning like this; in a quiet house, enjoying breakfast, without a care in the world.

When she was done eating and cleaning up, she threw on her coat and boots and made her way out the door.

In the first moment after stepping out of the house, the winter air felt almost painfully icy on her skin, but she quickly got used to the cold sensation and was soon able to enjoy the sun on her face. If it hadn’t been for the snow wherever she looked, the weather could have almost tricked her into thinking it was still summer.

It was only a short walk to her fathers’ book store, but Daisy chose the detour through town to enjoy the fresh air a little while longer. She marched along the street, purposely dragging her feet through the snow and watching it gather up on the tip of her boot. She had always done this when she was little and it still brought on a feeling of joy.

Despite the detour, her walk didn’t take her very long, and soon enough, she pushed open the heavy door of the book store and was greeted with the bright sound of the bell. The inside was buzzing with customers, some of them roaming the shelves, some sitting in the reading corner devouring their selected books or enjoying a drink from the adjacent café. When Daisy inhaled, she smiled at the smell of brand-new books and freshly brewed coffee. If someone asked her for a definition of home, this would be it.

She wriggled herself past a small group of customers to get to the cash register, where she spotted her dad packing a stack of books into a bag and handing it to the woman on the other side of the counter. She reached them just as her father was wishing the customer a nice day. His face lit up when his eyes landed on his daughter. “Good morning, kid.”

Daisy smiled back, but couldn’t hold back the sarcastic tone in her voice. “It’s noon, dad.”

“It’s morning for you”, he replied with a wink and placed a “Will return in a moment” sign on the counter, before turning his full attention to her. “How was your morning? Did you sleep alright?”

She nodded in response. “Thanks for the pancakes”, she said, and after a short pause she added, “Wanna put me to work?” with a gesture towards the shelves in front of them.

Phil seemed surprised, but pleased none the less. “Of course. I could use the help. With Jemma on maternity leave, I’m down a pair of hands.”

Daisy tried not to flinch at the mention of her childhood friends name and swallowed down the feeling of guilt over not having kept in touch with her, over not knowing about her pregnancy or her daughter’s birth. Instead, she asked: “Where do you need me?”

Her father directed her to the back room, where a row of boxes stood unopened. “They came in this morning”, Phil explained, “and I haven’t gotten around to unpacking and sorting them yet. Would you mind?”

Daisy shook her head No. “Not at all. Not like I have anything better to do, anyway.” She grabbed the first box, lifting it onto the nearby desk, before letting herself fall onto the chair behind it.

“Okay then.” Her father leaned down and pressed a quick kiss onto the top of her head. “Come find me if you need anything.”

After he left, Daisy switched on the office’s computer. She then began to cut open the boxes with a scissor she found in one of the desk drawers. When unloading the stacks of books, she organized them in alphabetical order and logged them into the system. The password was still the same all these years later – a combination of her birth date and her adoption date.

The work was boring, but nevertheless, Daisy was thankful to keep busy, and so, time flew by quickly. Soon, she felt her stomach rumbling uncomfortably, but decided to ignore it for a little while longer, so she could finish sorting the new books into the shelves.

She loaded as many into her arms as she could carry without dropping them, then used her elbows to push the door open. The inside of the book store had calmed down, now being almost completely empty. When she glanced to the front door, she noticed the only light outside was cast by a nearby street lamp. She hadn’t noticed just how late it had gotten in the windowless back room. It had to be almost closing time by now.

A hard collision and the sound of books tumbling to the ground rudely interrupted her thought process.

Daisy yelped as several books bounced off of her legs on their way down. Cursing quietly under her breath, she looked up to see what had caused her crash.

In front of her stood a man, about her age with dark skin and dark eyes, looking down at her with a concerned expression on his face. He didn’t sound angry or upset when he asked with a surprisingly soft voice: “You okay?”

“Fine. I’m sorry”, she mumbled in response and already knelt down to begin gathering up her chaos, when the man suddenly gasped audibly. Daisy flinched, bracing herself for whatever angry reaction was to come, but it didn’t happen.

Instead, the man exclaimed: “Daisy Johnson? Is that you?”

Daisy looked up at him, unable to hide the confusion that was undoubtedly spreading across her face. She took a second to look at his face closely, his dark, chocolate-colored eyes, raised brows and the bright smile, and that’s when it clicked.

“Trip?” He confirmed by nodding, and now it was her turn to gasp in pleasant surprise. “No way!” She tossed the book she had just picked up aside onto the next shelf and launched forward to throw her arms around him. He returned her hug just as firmly, and when she let him go, they both wore the same delighted expression on their faces. “What are you doing here?”

“I come in here all the time. Mr. C gives me great quantity discounts for my students”, Trip said, smirking. “But I should be the one asking you that question. I haven’t seen you here since Senior year of college.”

“You make it sound like that was a lifetime ago”, she countered, smoothly deflecting from his remark. “I can’t believe you still live in Snowboro. We always talked about getting out.”

“I moved back two years ago.” A brief shadow flashed across his face. “Anyway, uhm, I just came in here to place an order but I really gotta get going. Tomorrows quiz isn’t going to prepare itself.”

“Oh”, Daisy breathed, afraid to have said something wrong that caused this abrupt end to their conversation. “Sure, got it. It was really nice seeing you, Trip.”

Just as fast as it had appeared, the shadow vanished and Trip’s smile returned. “You too, Dais.”

When he walked away, Daisy returned to picking up the dropped books from the floor, but a second later she was startled again.

“Hey”, she heard Trip’s voice and saw him standing in the door frame, one foot already outside. “Do you wanna catch up sometime? Over coffee maybe?”

Daisy felt a grin spread over her face. “I would love that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry the ending here is really rushed, but I wanted to get it out there tonight so badly.


	3. December 3rd

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit of a filler chapter and therefore maybe a tiiiiny bit boring, but bear with me please, I promise the story is going to pick up more soon!
> 
> If you feel like it, I would be more than happy about some kudos and comments :)

**_December 3rd_ **

That night, Daisy lay awake, tossing and turning, but unable to find any rest. Her racing thoughts were keeping her from getting any sleep, too busy reminiscing in childhood memories and pondering over all the ‘What if’s. Sometime in the early morning hours, but still hours before the sun peaked out from behind the trees, she sighed heavily and rolled herself out of bed. She pulled her laptop out of her suitcase, where it was lying on top of all her clothes that she still hadn’t gotten herself to unpack. 

Daisy sat the computer down on her desk and placed herself in front of it before switching it on. She probably shouldn’t be doing this to herself, but before she could stop, she had already pulled up the Facebook website and typed “Antoine Triplett”.

His profile wasn’t set to private, luckily. Not that that would have stopped Daisy, but she would have felt much weirder than she already did if she would have had to hack her way into stalking her best friend from her childhood.

The picture at the top of his profile was an older one that Daisy recognized immediately, one of Trip standing outside the college they both had been attending until her transfer during their Senior year. She had been the one taking the photo, snapping it on her phone while they were sitting on the grassy area outside the library, studying for their final exams. She had made him laugh by throwing peanuts at him, trying to make him catch them with his mouth.

She smiled at the memory, but it was wiped off her face when she remembered how everything had changed just a few weeks after that.

She started scrolling down his profile to his personal information, where he had listed his education and home town. Obviously, she knew all this already, but what really surprised her was what was listed as his employment. “Teacher at Snowboro Middle School”, she read out loud to herself.

Daisy continued her scrolling. The most recent photo had been posted three weeks ago and it had tears welling up in her eyes. The shot showed Trip in a hospital room, sitting on the edge of a bed next to a blonde man and a brunette woman. Fitz and Jemma, Daisy realized. The exhaustion was written across Jemma’s face, but Daisy had never seen her look happier. She looked at the photo a bit more closely, and finally noticed the bundle in Trip’s arm, a bushel of light blonde hair and a tiny little face peeking out of the blanket. It was the same face she had seen on the card in her parents’ kitchen. Under the post, Trip had written the words “So happy for these two. Welcome, Alya Fitzsimmons.”

She moved her finger over the scroll wheel again, moving further down the page. There were some photos of Trip hiking on a mountain and in a forest. They were dated from this past July. After that, there was a gap with no posts and no pictures, so Daisy kept scrolling further until she noticed a bunch of posts that were almost exactly a year old, not from Trip himself, but from other people writing things like “So sorry for your loss” or “Sending you my condolences”. Her heart sunk when she saw a picture Trip had posted of himself as a little child, maybe three or 4 years old, sitting on a man’s lap that Daisy recognized to be his grandfather Gabriel. There was no caption to the photo, but it didn’t take a genius to add two and two together.

She quicky scrolled over it, before the lump in her throat could grow any more. She skipped over a bunch of pictures and birthday wishes, until she landed on one from 4 years ago. Trip in a black gown and a matching cap, one arm around his mother’s shoulders, the other one presenting his newly-received college diploma. She remembered that day clearly. It had been the last time she’d spoken to Trip on the phone, congratulating him on his graduation. She had promised she’d be back in town to visit him soon, that they would finally catch up about everything that had been going on since she’d moved half way across the country to New York. It had been an empty promise, and she had known that in the moment but hadn’t been ready to say Goodbye.

Daisy leaned back in her chair and inhaled deeply. She had told herself that she only wanted to look at Trip’s social media to see what he’d been up to, but really, it was see for herself what she had missed out on.

She thought back to their encounter in the book store the day before, and how happy she had felt just being around him, like the last 4 years hadn’t happened and they were still the same people they had been back then.

She thought about the flutter in her stomach that she had ignored when he’d suggested to catch up over coffee and about how she couldn’t wait to hold him to that offer.

That’s when it dawned on her that she didn’t even have his phone number anymore. How was she going to get in touch with him? She assumed she could just ask her father and he would probably be able to give her his number, but then there was the added difficulty of her not even having a phone at the moment.

Then she thought of another idea.

She clicked on the “Create a profile” button on top of the page and started filling in her e-mail address. She hesitated when she reached the gap that asked for her first and last name. She almost closed the browser right then and there, but then something came to her mind. In stead of her real first name, Daisy typed in “Skye”, the nickname she had gone by a kid, before she had met her biological father and found out the name intended for her by her birth mom. No one knew her by that name anymore, no one that hadn’t known her in her early childhood days even knew that it had ever existed. But Trip would remember, she was sure of it.

Daisy finished creating the account, then went right back to Trip’s profile, she let the cursor hover over the friend request button for just a second before hitting Send, and immediately, the faint flutter she had felt in her stomach yesterday was back.

She shook her head and quickly closed the laptop before she could over-think her decision any more. With the brightness of her screen gone, she noticed the sky outside her window slowly begin to turn lighter and a yawn rose in her chest. She got up from her desk chair and moved back across her room into her bed. She had barely managed to pull her blanket up to her chin when her exhaustion got the best of her and she finally fell into a dreamless sleep.

* * *

She was startled awake only a few short hours later, by two loud “Ding” sounds coming from her computer that was still sitting on her desk. Daisy needed a minute to let her heartrate recover from the initial shock before grabbing the laptop and settling back into bed with it on her lap.

She opened it back to the Facebook page that she had left unclosed earlier, except now there was red dot in the top right corner, indicating a new notification. When Daisy clicked on it, the first one read: “Antoine Triplett has accepted your friend request.” The second one was a private message from Trip, that she had to open separately in order to read it.

“What’s with the name?”, the message said with a winking smiley face added at the end of it.

With a smile playing at the corner of her mouth, she typed back: “Somehow a girl’s gotta keep her privacy on the world wide web.”

Daisy hadn’t really expected another message so soon after that, but another text bubble popped up almost immediately after. “Fair enough. What were you doing up at 4 in the morning?”

“Couldn’t sleep”, she sent back. “What are you doing up at 7am?”

“Some of us have jobs, you know.” The message was decorated with another winky face.

Daisy laughed quietly to herself while writing down her response. “Right. A Middle School Teacher. What’s that all about?”

“Have you been stalking me?”, came Trip’s answer, but before she could react to it, he added: “I get out of work at 3. Let’s meet for coffee and I’ll tell you all about it.”

The smile on her face widened and without a second thought she had already sent back: “It’s a date.”

“Oh no”, she said to herself when she realized the implication of her words, but there was no time for her to panic before another message reached her inbox.

“Definitely.”


	4. December 3rd Part 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I missed the past two days! I hope this chapter at least makes up for it a little bit :)

**_December 3rd – Part 2_ **

After managing to get another couple of hours of sleep, Daisy spent the rest of the morning in bed. She couldn’t even remember the last time she had been able to treat herself to this luxury. At one point, she had even reached for a book and read almost a hundred pages, just for the fun of it.

Feeling relaxed and refreshed despite her rather short night, she finally crawled out from under her blanket and started getting ready when the clock struck 2.30.

Making herself look like what she deemed to be a presentable human being took her a surprisingly little amount of time. She brushed her teeth, fixed her hair and put on the smallest bit of make-up – just mascara and some tinted powder. After that, she grabbed the nearest pair of jeans and her favorite mustard-colored sweater, threw them on and headed down the stairs. She was just about to slip into her coat when she caught a glimpse at herself in the mirror. She stopped dead in her tracks. What had she been _thinking_?

Letting her coat fall onto the ground, Daisy sprinted back up the stairs, taking two steps at a time. In her room, she started rummaging through the contents of her suitcase until she pulled out a black knitted dress from the very bottom and switched her yellow sweater and the jeans out for it. But somehow, she felt like the dress wasn’t quite right either, so she pulled it back off and looked around the mess she had just produced. Her eyes caught sight of a red blouse and a pair of black paper bag pants that she remembered buying for a meeting with a client that she had really wanted to impress. With a shrug of her shoulders, she went for it. She was half-way out her bedroom’s door when she came to a halt once again, turning back on her heels. She peeled of the new blouse and threw it across the room, discarding the foreign feeling she had gotten the moment she’d put it on.

What was one even supposed to wear to an occasion like this? And even more importantly, what even was this occasion, exactly? Sure, they both had referred to this as a date. But he hadn’t actually meant it. Had he?

“Get a grip”, Daisy scolded herself, shaking her head at how ridiculous she was being. She was simply on her way to catch up with an old friend she had known since she was 5. Nothing more and nothing less. No reason to overthink an outfit choice this many times. Sighing, she retracted back to what had been her first choice – the yellow sweater and simple jeans. After all, it was what made her feel most like herself.

A few minutes later, Daisy was out the door and on her way into town. Her clothing odyssey had made her late, but she had no choice but to slow down in order not to slip and fall on the icy side walk. When she reached the café they had agreed on, she could already spot Trip through the window sitting at a table by himself. There were several sheets of paper piling up next to him and he had a pen pushed behind his ear the same way he had always done when they’d been in school.

Suddenly worried that he had been waiting long, she entered the café and rushed over to his table. “I’m so sorry I’m late”, she started gushing right away, without as much as making him aware of her presence. “I was on time but then I got distracted and I didn’t mean- “

Her flow of words was interrupted when Trip looked up and chuckled. “Woah, calm down, girl. How about a Hello first?” He lifted himself out of his chair and greeted her by wrapping his arms around her in a warm hug. Instantly, all her worries melted away.

He had her sit down and get settled into her chair while he went to order some hot beverages for them at the counter. While she was waiting, Daisy gazed over at the handwritten papers on the table. They were stacked quite messily, thus she was able to catch a glimpse at some of the titles. One scrawly headline read “Bridge to Terabithia”, another one said “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”. When Trip returned, a steaming mug in each hand, she was craning her head to be able to see more.

“It’s always the most popular assignment of the year”, he commented as he sat down and placed their drinks in front of them. “With the students, but also for me. Mostly for me, if I’m honest.”

Daisy looked up at him questioningly, awaiting further elaboration.

“I let the kids pick whatever book they like to read”, Trip explained, his voice taking on a blissful tone. “I then ask them to write a paper about all the feelings they had while reading their book. You would never believe the things these 6th graders are able to feel.”

“Actually”, Daisy began, making a dramatic pause to take a sip of her hot peppermint cocoa, “the thing that I’m having a hard time believing is that you became a teacher. Antoine Triplett. A 6th grade English teacher. How did that happen?”

Shrugging his shoulders, it was now Trip’s turn to sip on his coffee. “Principal Hand offered me the position when I moved back here. I think she’s always liked me, since we were kids. I needed a job so I took it and turns out I’m pretty good at it.”

Daisy nodded along to his words, realizing that they made perfect sense. Of course Trip would be great at teaching kids English, with it always having been his favorite subject. “Do you still write?”

The smile on his face turned wistful. “Occasionally. Not so much since my…” He trailed off, leaving his sentence unfinished.

“I heard about your grandpa. I’m really sorry”, Daisy says quietly and reached across the table to place her hand on top of his. “Was he the reason you came back to Snowboro?”

“Yes and no”, Trip responded and she felt his hand clench up into a fist. “I came back for his funeral but my mom had a really hard time dealing with it, so I stayed for her.”

She offered him a sympathetic smile. “I think she’s very lucky to have you.”

Trip audibly cleared his throat. “Let’s not talk about sad things anymore, okay?” After Daisy nodded in agreement, he continued. “Tell me about you. How is… oh, what’s his name again?”

Daisy froze, the blood in her veins running cold. Every muscle in her body tensed up. It was an involuntary reaction, not one she had any control over no matter how much she wished that she did. She could practically feel her brain darting back and forth, hastily looking for a way to get out of this conversation, but she came up blank. Her inner tumult couldn’t have taken longer than a couple of seconds, but it was enough to allow the panic to spread all across her face. She was sure that any moment now Trip would ask her what was wrong. He would press on and push her and she wouldn’t have the courage to explain.

But instead, all he did was twist around his hand to wrap his fingers around hers and squeeze gently. Without any other comment, he asked, his voice lighthearted as always: “So what’s life like in the Big Apple?”

Her mouth still felt dry like sandpaper but she was overcome with a sense of relief. She managed to answer his question, and just like that, they fell into an easy conversation, both of them ignoring the moment of tension. Soon enough they were laughing and sharing childhood memories, Trip’s hand not once letting go of Daisy’s. Time passed without them taking any notice of it, until a story about one of Trip’s students was interrupted by a noise. “Ahem.”

They looked up simultaneously. In front of their table stood the young girl that had been waiting on them all afternoon. “I’m really sorry to interrupt”, she said and sounded like she really meant it, “but I really have to close up now.”

Daisy quickly took a look around the café and surprisingly came to find that the place was empty apart from the two of them. “Oh”, she said, feeling her cheeks blush.

The girl handed them their bill, and before Daisy could even reach into her pockets for her tiny wallet, Trip had already placed a twenty on the table. “You don’t have to do that”, she tried to protest, but to no avail.

“No way am I gonna go on a date with a girl and let her pay.” He winked at her exaggeratedly, and even though Daisy knew he was saying it as a joke, the butterflies in her stomach went haywire.

They gathered up their things and headed for the door. Outside, tiny snowflakes were tumbling down from the sky, illuminated by the light of the lanterns. The streets were quiet, the only sound being the door of the café falling into its lock behind them. Slowly, Daisy came to realize that this was probably where they would have to say Goodbye, but as soon as they stepped out into the cold, Trip wrapped his gloved hand around hers once more and her fingers slipped in between his like it was the most natural thing in the world. “Can I walk you home?”, he asked and immediately received his answer in form of a nod and a beaming smile.

After a whole afternoon of talking, the pair now walked side by side along the streets in a comfortable silence, neither of them wanting to interrupt the peaceful quiet of the night. As they went, Daisy allowed herself to glance over at Trip from time to time. He had grown a bit more of a beard since she’d last seen him, but other than that, he looked exactly the way she remembered and it made her wonder what he remembered about her from the last couple of months they had spent together. She watched a couple of tiny ice crystals collect on his long, dark eyelashes and when he blinked them away, she averted her eyes with a smile.

After what simultaneously felt like many hours and just a split second, they reached her parents’ house. He walked her up the steps to the front door and said: “Tonight was great. I missed you, Daisy.”

His words stung a little, but she didn’t want to let him see it. “I missed you too. You don’t even know how much.”

Trip took a step towards her. He was now close enough for Daisy to see his breath condense in the cold air in front of her, and when he leaned down, she could feel it tickling on her skin. She was sure that he must be able to hear her heart pounding against her chest as his warm lips gently touched her cheek.

When he finally pulled back, the expression on his face was unreadable. “Goodnight”, Trip said softly, before turning around and slowly climbing down the stairs.

“Night”, Daisy breathed back. With her hand already resting on the doorhandle, she let her eyes follow him until he disappeared into the night.


End file.
